WASHINGTON AUTISM ALLIANCE & ADVOCACY
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Mission Statement
We expand access to healthcare, education and services for people with autism and other intellectual and developmental disabilities in Washington State.
About This Cause
Vision All families in Washington State have the resources they need to support the well-being of loved ones with autism and other intellectual and developmental disabilities. Values Calm, confident competence. Creative, cutting-edge advocacy. Nimble, flexible and responsive service. Why Choose Us? WAA is the nation’s only legal advocate for people with autism and other intellectual and developmental disabilities that pairs individual/family navigation with legal services regardless of ability to pay. We have a highly successful track record of legislative advocacy. We’ve opened access to service for 14,582 clients directly in the last 7 years, with an average of 2000 clients served every year, and ensured rights to coverage for over 68,000. Our staff has specialized training and personal experience with autism and developmental disabilities, giving us practical and empathetic expertise. How far we've come WAA started in 2007 with only four members who had children with autism and wanted to fight for their right to autism health benefits. Three years and 800 members later, we successfully achieved health care coverage for all of them through Washington state insurance. We also had several other wins for individuals covered by private insurers. Our efforts have helped more than 68,000 Washington residents secure autism coverage to pay for vital therapies that would otherwise cost a family $25,000 to $50,000 per year. Today we provide Insurance, Family Resource and Education Navigation to an average of 2,100 member families a year, in every County in Washington. We continue to lobby for social change and improved public policies on behalf of children and adults with autism. We are a mighty but very small team of fierce advocates and need your help to continue to make the impact we are making statewide. Our Funding Sources Washington Autism Alliance is a not-for-profit organization with a 14 person staff, 7 of them part-time. We provide a broad range of pro bono Insurance, Family Resource and education navigation and advocacy services to families of children with ASD/DD. At our inception our work was paid for by Shayan's Fund, a legislative budget proviso combined with a grant both restricted to insurance navigation and insurance appeals. Our low overhead costs are covered by philanthropy and corporate partnerships State and federal laws require that we use restricted funds for target populations and very specific and narrow scope of work. This leaves WAA uncompensated for the many of the vital services that our staff provides, often times on their own time. These include comprehensive and in-depth advocacy on behalf of families and service providers, technical support to providers and agencies on health benefits, insurance and education policies to improve access to services for ASD/DD statewide and taking on systems reform to improve autism provider capacity to address pervasive waiting lists faced by low income individuals/ families that can be up to 4 years. We seek to sustain these vital services through direct donor funding.